“I’m not under too much of an illusion of how smart or un-smart I am because filmmaking ultimately is about teamwork.”

If you change the rules on what controls you… you will change the rules on what you can control.

I can understand that the whole world is interested in my wife Madonna. That’s even why I married her.

I think it’s that much harder to make a good comedy than it is straight and apparently serious.

I like to think that we’ve got a plan, so let’s stick to it. That said, once we’ve stuck to it, we’re allowed as much improvisation as anyone cares to indulge themselves in.

I suppose directing on set is the most fun because it’s a good crack and you feel you’re on the battlefield whereas writing is a fairly solitary undertaking.

I don’t like the idea of agents in a typical form. The idea of agents, to me, brings up the idea of a man in a very boring suit who’s not very good looking and doesn’t have much attention to style.

It’s not easy to strap yourself down to a desk and bash on a keyboard when you know you can direct lots of films, because directing films is fun and interactive and gregarious. Writing isn’t.

One of the interesting and exciting things about my job is watching technological ground being pioneered.

I got too fed up with films that didn’t make you think. I liked the idea of one that you’d have to be dancing around with. I like my mind to be engaged when I watch a film.

I’d like to work with the missus, but there’s nothing in the pipeline at the moment.

Previously, on Lock, Stock, I went to bed at two in the morning and woke up at five in the morning, and on this one I was known to nod off on the set occasionally.

I like death. I’m a big fan of it.

I’m not politically motivated. I used to be – passionately. I used to be very Left wing. Then I went very Right wing, and now I rest somewhere in the middle.

I like filming in the UK – I’ll sleep in my own bed, which I’m really happy about.

It’s OK to have beliefs, just don’t believe in them.

Jake Green isn’t just Jake Green. Jake represents all of us. The colour green is the central column of the spectrum and the name Jake has all sorts of numerical values. All things come back to him within the film’s world of cons and games.

Your illusions are a part of you like your bones and flesh and memory.

No battle is ever won … victory is an illusion of philosophers and fools.

I’ve never had any illusions about being a lead actor in films, because lead actors have to be of a certain kind. Apart from the beauty of looks and figure, which I cannot claim to have, there’s just a particular kind of ordinary-Joe quality that a film star needs to have.

I have no illusions concerning the precarious status of my tales and do not expect to become a serious competitor of my favorite weird authors.

Fear is our deepest and strongest emotion, and the one which best lends itself to the creation of nature-defying illusions.

Therefore trust to thy heart, and to what the world calls illusions.

Romantic love is an illusion. Most of us discover this truth at the end of a love affair or else when the sweet emotions of love lead us into marriage and then turn down their flames.

I am disillusioned enough to know that no man’s opinion on any subject is worth a damn unless backed up with enough genuine information to make him really know what he’s talking about.